Sorry!

I know it has been a little while since I posted anything. With the wedding in a month and a half and my sons birthday next week things have been kinda crazy. I have done a few things and will try to get them up in the next week or so.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Pretzel Bites

I found this recipe originally on twotinykitchens.com and I love it, my hubby and son love them and they are SO good.
What you need
1 cup of creamy peanut butter
2 tbs of butter
1/2-3/4 of a cup of powdered sugar
3/4 of a cup of brown sugar
1 bag of chocolate chips
pretzels

1. Mix the peanut butter and softened butter
2. Add the sugars and mix well.
3. Here is where you need to decide if you need more sugar or not. If you can roll the mixture into balls without it sticking to your fingers you are good. If not you need to add more sugar until you can.
4. Roll a ball of around a tablespoon but you can use more or less if you like, of the mixture and press it gently between two pretzels.
5. Place the pretzels on a pan lined with wax paper in the freezer for about 30 minutes to set.
6. When the pretzels are set, put the chocolate chips in a bowl and melt them in the microwave at 30 second intervals, stirring in between until completely melted.
7. Immediately take the pretzel/peanut butter sandwiches and dip half in the cholocate and place back on the wax paper.
8. When they are all dipped put them in the freezer until the chocolate is set

That is it. They are a little time consuming but they are SO good and SO worth it!

Painted Bread

Last night Logan had a sleep over with one of his best friends, my best friends daughter. We had an early supper and decided we needed a snack later in the evening. This is something that the kids really had fun doing.
What is needed
Milk, Bread, food coloring, paint brushes, cinnamon and sugar

Pour the milk into some sort of containers. Bowls, or like we used a cupcake tin. You won't need much for each one. I used this because it was easiest with two kids and multiple colors.

I added two drops of food coloring for each cup. You may have to add more if you have a bigger bowl and more milk.

Make sure you set up an area where they have room to work and won't mess anything up if they spill or drip. Also, use new paint brushes! Very important. Even if you clean them well it is to much of a risk to use for the kiddos.

Then let your little ones creative side take over! I gave them each 3 pieces of bread and a paper towel to wipe the brushes on before they dipped them into a new color.

And here are their finished creations! Before you put them in the oven, sprinkle them with cinnamon and sugar and then toast them! These two had so much fun with this project and then eating their creations!

Pizza roll ups

My guy works 6 on 3 off and every other week works nights. On those nights I usually try out some of my more kid friendly recipe ideas. Last night was one of those nights. 

What you need

2 cans of crescent rolls

Pepperoni

Mozzarella string cheese

Lay out your crescent roll and add a few pepperoni and half of a piece of the string cheese. Roll it up tight and try to cover as much of the ends as you can so the cheese doesn't leak out when it starts to melt. 

Bake by the directions on the rolls. When they are done you can use pizza sauce or ranch to dip them in and there you have it!

Plants update

Our plants stalled out about here. I think the bout of cold weather got to them. Since I took this pic it warmed up a little and they are looking perky.

Travel Coloring

I was cleaning out a closet and found an old small wipes container and remembered this project I had wanted to try.

 What you will need is a small wipes container, a pack of post-its, some crayons, and a glue gun.
It is really simple. You use the glue gun and glue the post-its to the inside of the wipers container. Toss in the crayons and you have a small, contained, travel coloring container for the little ones. You can also use pens in it and keep it in your car for when you need to make notes for yourself.

Under the kitchen sink/chemical cabinet project

So, for a long time the cabinet under my sink has just been sitting unused. I decided I was going to move my chemicals under there. Here is my little make over project.

Here is the most important step.  A child proof lock for the door. My 4 year old has never messed with this stuff, but I don't want to take that risk.

Here is the cabinet space. Our cabinets are metal and that is rust. I wish we could replace them but one we rent and two we don't have the money.

To cover up the rust and make it easier to clean I used some peel and stick tiles I have had for a while. I believe they were about $10 at Alco.

Then I added a tension rod I bought at Walmart for about $5. I will use this to hang spray bottles on .

I used two dish tubs bought for $1.97 at Walmart to hold the bigger containers

And a couple of small baskets, 3 for $4.98 at Walmart, to hold smaller things, rags, and sponges. 

And all done! I love that it is so much more organized and was able to utilize a space that was just going to waste!

Rice Krispy Sushi

We made these for my 4 year old sons Pre-k class for treats and they loved them!
 What is needed
3 cups of Fruity Pebbles
1 bag of marshmallows
3 tablespoons of butter
Fruit roll-ups
Twizzlers

1. Melt the butter in a large pan. 
2. Add marshmallows and cook until they are completely melted, you must stir constantly then remove from heat
3. Add the cereal, mix well
4. Press into pan, let set for about an hour
5. Cut the Twizzlers into the heights that you want your "sushi" to be
6. Cut fruit roll ups into about 4 strips.
7. Cut treats into strips about a quarter of an inch wide
8. Wrap about an inch around the Twizzlers piece and mold into a ball
9. Wrap the fruit roll up around the "sushi" ball and mold it around it.

And there you go. I doubled the recipe for his class and made almost 60 and had left over rice krispy treats. It does take some time to make that many but the kids loved them!

Upcoming project

If everything goes as planned (haha right) I am going to be redoing under my sink in my kitchen. I will post all that I am doing up here when I am done. Wish me luck!

Golden Gods

A little something for my fellow metal moms out there

Snow Fun

We got our first snow of the season last night. While I am less than enthused, I hate snow, but the little guy was thrilled. So, for him to have some fun with the snow, we filled a standard spray bottle with water and food coloring. He had a lot of fun painting the snow!

Homemade Find It

This is one of our favorite projects in our house. We use these for fun, learning (reading), and as a calming tool for time outs. If you don't know what a find it is it is a toy that is filled with colored plastic and all sorts of little dodads that you try to find in colored plastic. These can have different themes with all the toys related or like this one we made just have things you find around the house.
What is needed:
1 one liter or 20 oz bottle. Two liter is to big and makes it nearly impossible to find things and are also heavy for little ones. I like the one liter best because it is close to the size of the store bought toy
20 different things for the child to find. Remember they have to be small enough to fit through the mouth of the bottle but big enough to not get lost in the rice
1 bag of rice
A piece of paper to write your list on
A clothes pin
Hot glue gun or super glue

1. Make your list with all the things you are putting in the find it.
2. Remove the label and clean the bottle
3. After it dries, pour in rice until the bottle is about half way full
4. Put in your "finds"
5. Pour more rice in the bottle until it is about 3/4 of the way full
6. Put on the lid and shake the toys until they are mixed pretty evenly through out
7. Fill the bottle the rest of the way with the rice, pretty much to the top (it will settle as it is played with)
8. Use the hot glue gun and put glue on the threads of the bottle and put the lid on. This way your little one can't open it and pour rice all over your house, car, or where ever.
9. Finally hot glue the clothes pin to the outside of the bottle. This will hold the list so it doesn't get lost.

And there you go. Your very own find it.

Treat cup

So here is a simple little project to make a treat cup for your kids. This works great for diaper bags and traveling. All you do is cut the bottom off of two 2 liter bottles. Take a 12 inch zipper and hot glue each side to to the bottle bottoms and there you go. You have a zip up treat cup that you can keep snacks, cheerios, or whatever you want in. Logan put stickers on his, which come off when washing, but he just redecorates it. You could also have your little one paint it. The stained glass paint would work best.

Flower update

I forgot to post this the other night but our flowers are growing! And teaching Logan the word "photosynthesis" has been fun and funny.

Simple Plaque for Teachers

We always try to do something fun and creative for Logan's teachers. This is what we decided to give them (along with a box of chocolates) for Valentines day. I should have taken step by step pictures and I didn't. I will try to remember next time, still getting use to this blogging thing lol. Here is what we did. We bought these wooden plaques at Wal Mart for about $3 a piece. First I had Logan pic out the stencil color for each teacher. I set that aside for each one so there was none of that color on that specific plaque. Then I let him paint them however he wanted. I helped a little filling in little spots where he missed when he was trying to be careful around the edges, but that is all. Then I let those dry over  night. The next day when he got home from school I helped him stencil the teachers initials and the hearts, star, and flower. We sprinkled glitter on them while the paint was still wet. After that dried I hot glued ribbon on the back, he wrote his name on the back and that was it. A creative and original gift for his teachers. Add the box of chocolates, one of his valentines day cards, and some ribbon and the gift is complete.

I love you this much card

Disclaimer

Maybe I should have posted this in the beginning but I didn't so here I go. I do get a LOT of my ideas from other places. Friends, family, Pinterest. I do come up with some myself but I do try a lot of things we see on Pinterest or that friends and family have tried. So there is my disclaimer.

Shaving bath fun

Something fun for the kids. Much cheaper then bath foam. We mixed shaving cream with a couple drops of food coloring for some bathtub fun! My 4 year old LOVES this. We already had an old shower mirror and an old rubber Veet bladeless razor and he will use a smallish paint brush and apply, shave, and reapply mustaches and beards over and over! They can also use it to paint themselves and the shower and it washes right off!

Mini Taco Bowls

Still playing catch up from past projects. These are fun to make, especially if you have little ones. You take wonton wraps and put them in a cupcake pan to make cups. Put them in the oven at about 350* until the are brown. Make your taco meat like you normally would and after the cups are done you put the meat inside. Add your favorite toppings and there you go! Mini taco bowls.

Sweet and Salty Cookies

Here is a quick and easy and super yummy recipe that I got from a friend of mine. We just made these the other day. All you do is take your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, even the just add butter and egg kind will work, add a couple cups of crushed pretzels and Ruffles chips and bake! One of the best sweet and salty treats you can make yourself!

Learning About Plants

Today we are teaching our 4 year old about how plants grow in a quick and easy way. For around three dollars you can buy a pellet tray. You add water and the soil pellets expand and your little one pick out the flowers of their choice and can push 1-2 seeds in each one! As they grow you can talk to them about how they convert sunlight into food, what the roots do, and pollination. I will post pictures and updates on how our plants are doing!

Intro

Hello there. My first post is going to be pretty simple and just expand on my profile. My name is Sheila and I am one of those crazy stay at home mom people. My son is four, his name is Logan and he is in Pre-k and has ODD, oppositional defiant disorder. If you don't know what that is to put it simply you know how your child will have days where he will go left when you say right, stand up when you say sit, etc? Well my child is like that all day every day, except worse. I may go more into it later but for now I will leave it at that simple explanation. I never planned to be a stay at home mom. I am a very social, very independent woman. It has been an adjustment. I did go back to work for a while last year so Logan could go to daycare and get use to that social interaction. And to answer all the questions I usually receive. No, my guy isn't in anyway controlling, we are not religious fanatics, and I am in no way stupid or lazy. We are not rich, and we do not receive any government benefits. We do not live off tax payer money, Chris works very hard at a good job to support us all. This is a decision that we made together because it is what is best for our family. OK now that all that part is over, we can get down to business. I believe education should start at home, and continue there even when children start school. We do educational projects, home improvement projects, and some that are just plain fun. I like trying new, and sometimes fun, recipes. A friend encouraged me to start this to share these things with the wonder world wide web and after some thinking, here I am. So here we go! I will post some of the projects and things I have already done and work our way up to things we are working on now! I hope anyone reading this will enjoy and feel free to steal anything you want!